| Lyrics: | As sweet Polly Oliver lay musing in bed,
A sudden strange fancy came into her head.
"Nor
father nor mother shall make me false prove,
I'll 'list as a soldier, and follow my
love."
So early next morning she softly arose,
And dressed herself up in her dead
brother's clothes.
She cut her hair close, and she stained her face brown,
And went for a
soldier to fair London Town.
Then up spoke the sergeant one day at his
drill,
"Now who's good for nursing? A captain, he's ill."
"I'm ready," said Polly. To
nurse him she's gone,
And finds it's her true love all wasted and wan.
The
first week the docter kept shaking his head,
"No nursing, young fellow, can save him," he
said.
But when Pooly Oliver had nursed him back to life
He cried, "You have cherished him
as if you were his wife".
O then Polly Oliver, whe burst into tears
And told
the good doctor her hopes and her fears,
And very shortly after, for better or for
worse,
The captain took joyfully his pretty soldier nurse |